Carpenter's Code: Bringing Jesus to the App Store with Beauty and Excellence

What happens when a team from Google quits their jobs and starts working from a garage in Palo Alto and sets to work building technology to connect people to God and to each other? They start prototyping and testing dozens of ways to connect people with God, find a magic moment in guided audio prayers, quit their jobs and become the top grossing prayer app on iTunes.

That team from the garage became the company Carpenters Code, a Silicon Valley based tech company, creating beautiful apps like the Abide Prayer App.

Their mission is to disciple the nations through Christ-centered technologies. They’ve started with Abide, a mobile app for praying together. In addition to allowing people to speak prayers and send them to friends, the app also offers guided, spoken prayer in several themes: freedom from depression, insomnia, becoming more like Jesus, talking to hurting friends, celebrating recovery, and others.

Abide has already hosted over 2 million people globally in prayer since last year. With phenomenal testimonies of deep personal transformation, Abide is having impact.

The Investment Structure

The heart and mission of the company could have allowed Carpenters to organize as a charity and raise money in the form of donations. However, the founders realized that competing with Angry Birds, Snapchat, and Instagram requires more marketing funding than most nonprofits could raise (or stomach). And while the company is structured as a for-profit, most investors see their decision to get involved as primarily impact-driven. Not that making money isn't a goal, but the primary motivator is impacting lives for eternity.

The Team

They have a veteran team from Google, eBay and Tesla and other cutting edge firms engaged in a rich and fun fellowship, striving together for professional excellence and to live out the walk together by praying, studying and worshiping together.